Archive for the ‘Individual Savings’ Category

Instant Online Credit Card Application

November 21, 2011 at 4:36 pm

You can get an instant online credit card application on the Web. Simply go to safe areas where you can apply for credit cards online. Instant approval credit cards, 0-interest, and other types of card offers are available.

Instant online credit card application is easy to fill out. It takes a few minutes if you have all of your information together before you start filling in the form. Simply provide the company with a few details when you start filling out the application. Once you are done, review the application to ensure that you filled out the form the best you can.

Submit your application online by hitting the Submit tab listed on the websites. Once you submit your application, a lender or provider will send you an email to let you know he/she has received your information. An expert from this point will evaluate your application and does a credit check to see which card you qualify for. (more…)

Tips for Future Financial Planning Portfolio for Retirement Employee

Comments (0)

April 7, 2011 at 7:48 am

Have you ever thought that how you should do future planning for your children? We are now discussing related to the opportunity that you should deploy your future planning. Opportunity means life insurance, mutual funds, equities and fixed deposit should all features are Financial Planning options for your children. And also you make plan for your retirement and other objectives, like as buying property, investment in various industries area and so on.

Mutual Fund:
Nowadays; mutual Fund is the most popular option. Mutual fund is the best option to make money from difference financial services. Investors can invest money in the different segments like gold, equities, debt and also property and various mutual fund schemes. Important thing is that investing and managing your money is need expertise skill. For example: The Fund Manager: Investors can get bunch of benefits by using experience of fund manager by paying a little fee at one time or annually.

Fixed Income:
Fixed income or Fixed Deposit, name itself suggests that fixed income, Get secure return on the maturity of the deposit. Positive point of Fixed Deposit is that investor will get fixed income at the time of maturity. This option is also very popular in different financial services. Fixed income has the capacity to convey a degree of constancy to the Objectives.

PPF:
Usually, Fixed Deposit by Banks has been well-known investment avenues in this part. Same, small investment schemes like PPF (Public Provident Fund) can also aspect in the group.

Life insurance is the one of the basic saving system of this type of portfolio. It is the essential requirement of Every Human being.

After retirement there are the most thing activities Financial Planning will acquire. If you dont know where the money is coming from once you have established working, you wont have a very pleasurable life.

Retirement from the any services which is makes considerable changes in employees life style. Different Occupations have different retirement ages. There are many reasons behind the employees leaving the jobs.

There are many person get so caught up in the hustle and bustle of their daily lives that they dont even consider having a retirement plan until it is too late. This is the main reason to lack of financial planning behind it.

Employees must need to start planning for this important thing. Now in these days, there are many finance company interested to help to employee for their retirement plan through different choices. And also they give much opportunity by conducting seminar for more information on this area. Because of financial companies have made research on the same and make database by gathering sophisticated data. These all companies have a lot of idea behind employees retirement planning.

And finally, we hope these article will give you more finance technique, more investment criteria and tips for financial planning. We hope your future after retirement is bright and your remaining golden year pass with enjoy.

The Truth About Direct Deposit- Survey Uncovers Payment Myths

Comments (0)

April 2, 2011 at 9:03 am

Despite 95 percent of Americans having heard or read about identity theft, a new survey reveals that many are unaware of the security differences between direct deposit and paper checks-placing them at greater risk for identity theft and fraud.

The survey, sponsored by the U.S. Department of the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Banks, is the latest public service initiative of the Go Direct campaign. Go Direct aims to motivate people who receive Social Security by paper check to switch to the safer, easier option of direct deposit.

Despite the fact that direct deposit has been around for more than two decades, the survey found that four out of 10 Americans (40 percent) do not use it.

According to the Treasury, direct deposit is simply the best way to receive federal benefits. Direct deposit eliminates the risk of lost or stolen checks, reduces fraud, protects against identity theft and gives people more control over their money. Plus, direct deposit provides people with immediate access to their money from virtually everywhere.

In addition, the survey found many Americans don’t know the facts about safeguarding their money and identity. Key myths about direct deposit and paper checks are:

• MYTH: Sixty-two percent of those surveyed said a paper check with your name on it can only be cashed if you sign or endorse it.

FACT: Checks can be forged-some more easily than others. Payments that come in the mail are especially vulnerable to theft and forgery.

• MYTH: Nearly half of those polled said direct deposit of payments such as wages, salary or government benefits go through the Internet to be deposited into your account.

FACT: Direct deposit works by transferring funds directly into your account through a highly secure electronic banking system-not the Internet. It is the same system used by the world’s leading financial institutions.

• MYTH: Nearly 40 percent of respondents replied false to the statement, “No direct deposit has ever been lost or stolen.”

FACT: The direct deposit system creates records of transactions so payments can be traced, and that means problems-although very rare-are quickly fixed. It’s also a fact that you are 30 times more likely to have a problem with a check than with direct deposit. In 2004, more than 70,000 checks issued by the Treasury fell prey to endorsement forg-eries. These checks totaled more than $61 million.

These are all reasons why the Treasury and the Federal Reserve Banks are encouraging people who receive Social Security and other federal benefits to use direct deposit-the safest, easiest way to get payments. With direct deposit, people can be confident their payment will be in their savings or checking account on their payment day-on time, every time.

Individual Savings | Tags: Accumulation, Allies, Amount Of Money, Discipline, Emotional Battle, Habit, How Much Money, Income Earners, Long Periods Of Time, Milestones, Misers, Percentage Rate, Saving Money, Threshold, Wealth Creation, Whim

The Threshold between Wealth Creation & Destruction

Comments (0)

March 27, 2011 at 7:20 am

Wealth is simply the accumulation of money, and it can only be created by the amount of money that is received and never spent. If you want to build wealth, then anytime you receive money: dont spend all of it. Sure it is a very simple concept, but it is very difficult to continually achieve. Luckily there are readily available allies to help you: find some compelling reasons to start saving, build it into a habit, watch the results of your efforts build, and set some financial milestones to reward yourself.

Setting aside a percentage of any money that you receive is the best method to follow through and build the habit of saving money. There are a few misers among us who find saving easy to do, but most people want to spend far more than is earned; let alone have the discipline of spending less than what they earn. So it starts as an uphill mental and emotional battle that gets easier by following through with the habit, and seeing the results of your effort. Spending less than what you earn every week, every month, every year, is the only way to amass money.

How much money should you set aside to build up savings? It should be a percentage so that you automatically move it into a separate savings account anytime you receive income, without exception. It is my experience that the range of 3% to 10% is the most successful starting percentage for people who continue saving over long periods of time. Saving only 3% is so small that it is nearly painless to even the lowest income earners (this is actually where I began years ago). Selecting a percentage under 3% accumulates to such a tiny amount of savings that I havent heard of anyone sticking with it. And starting out by setting aside over 10% is too painful for even high income earners to withstand, because they are so accustomed to spending on every whim. As you repeatedly save a set percentage rate, it will become more habitual, automatic and expected. Then youll be ready to increase your percentage rate. And the higher the savings rate, your growing pile of money will create more motivation to continue to save. This summer, I spoke with a successful saver who lives very well on only 30% of his income. Because he saved diligently to continually buy rental homes, after a couple decades he earns over a million a year in rental income by Ashville, North Carolina.

In the fragile first years of saving money, it can take only a single wrong financial move to wipe out everything that youve saved so far. And the most common wrong move doesnt look like it when it is occurring. This draining move can also start insidiously small and build a different habit, the wealth-destruction habit. You know the problem: pay your credit card balance in its entirety, every month, without exception. As an example, if you havent saved money for a vacation before you depart, and then charge it all to your credit card, there is a giant probability that you wont pay it off for a very long time. The credit card companies know this and they are extracting interest dollars from you instead of earning interest yourself. Youve shifted to the dark side of wealth destruction where it is more common for your credit card balance to grow than shrink.

Lets get back to building your wealth. Once you start setting aside the savings percentage that youve decided and opened a dedicated savings account, you need to closely review your account statements for motivation. Reviewing the progress that youve made so far youll see how you are moving toward financial goals can be self-reinforcing. And another motivator is rewarding yourself by spending some money on yourself when youve reached certain milestones. For example, you could start with a goal of accruing $500, and reward yourself with something meaningful; and then each time you double your amount of savings you get another reward. My advice is to at least begin with a savings percentage, even as small as my 3%, and allow this simple concept be of great financial benefit to you.

The Quickest Way to Dramatically Increase Your Net Worth

Comments (0)

March 18, 2011 at 4:47 pm

Your net worth equals what you own minus what you owe. It is commonly referred to as the difference between your total assets and your total liabilities.

Heres a simple illustration:

Home Value = $350,000   Mortgage balance = $150,000
Investments = 100,000     Credit cards = 20,000
Auto = 45,000                  Auto loans = 30,000
Savings = 15,000             Bank loan = 4,000
You Own = $510,000        You Owe = $204,000

Therefore, your net worth would be $306,000.

There are two ways to increase your net worth. You can own more things or you can reduce your debt obligation. This article will focus on reducing your debt first because it is the fastest way to generate more money and, then, buy (own) more things.

In our example, you have $204,000 of debt. If youre like most people, you pay less attention to the mortgage and car loan balances because you consider them to be rather normal (necessary) to your way of life.

The credit card companies are probably charging somewhere between 12 to 18 percent (forget those slick, short-lived introductory teasers) and the bank loan is probably around 6 percent.

Now, before we go further let me ask you a question. Which is faster? Create $204,000 (in other words, own more) … or reduce $204,000 of debt? In both instances, the result is the same because your net worth will have increased by the same amount.

To create $204,000 in 15 years, you would have to invest $6,956.69 each year for 15 years and receive a guaranteed 8 percent rate of return. Where can you find a guaranteed rate of return this high in todays marketplace? No where!

To reduce $204,000 of debt in 13.5 years, it takes only $100 extra each month. Now, lets make sure you understand what I just said.

To increase your net worth by $204,000 you must invest almost $7,000 each year for 15 years. You hope and pray youll receive no less than 8 percent average every year.

Or… you can come up with only $100 each month to reduce 100% of your debt (to include your mortgage) in only 13.5 years — guaranteed! Hard to believe isnt it?

Go ahead and check it out yourself. First, use a compound interest table to compute the investment requirement. Then, print this
debt reduction chart. Youll need an Adobe Reader, which is probably already installed on your computer. Otherwise, go to adobe.com for a free download version.

In every instance, it is faster and more reliable to eliminate your liabilities than to increase your assets. Why? Because the interest you pay on your debt is excessively higher than the guaranteed interest you can earn.

By following the debt chart and adding an additional $100 each month to the minimum payment requirement, you can dramatically compound the effect of your payments and expedite the complete elimination of all your debt.

Its a lot easier to come up with $100 extra each month than it is to find $6,956.69 each and every year for the next 15 years.

Individual Savings | Tags: Amount Of Money, Bank Balance, Eight Months, Health And Happiness, Importance Of Saving Money, Important Things, Investing Money, Investment Bond, Lifestyle, Little Bit, Managed Money, Much Money, Parents, Pool, Target, Twenty Three Years, Wages, Wreckless

The Importance Of Saving Money For The Future

Comments (0)

March 10, 2011 at 3:25 pm

Money in my opinion is not the most important thing in life, but it is nice to know that you have a certain amount of money, saved or invested, which you can use if needed. I actually think that health and happiness are the two most important things in life. Having this pool of money helps to keep me healthy and happy, as it means that I do not have to stress as much about the future.

I only really realised the importance of investing and saving money, when I was twenty-three years of age. Up until this age, I would always spend all of my wages and did not care if I was overdrawn in the bank. I used to think that I could die tomorrow, so why bother about saving money which I might not ever use. This is a bit stupid, I know.

At the age of twenty-three, on one particular day, I was having a conversation with a friend called Tim. He basically earned the same amount of money as I did and lived a similar lifestyle. Tim told me that he was thinking of buying a flat and that he was going to cash in his investment bond to help fund the move. I was very shocked that he even had a bond and asked him how long he had had the bond, and how he had managed to get the money to put into it. I expected Tim to tell me that his parents had given him the money, but they hadn’t, he had saved up the money himself.

Tim told me that he tries to save as much money as he can per month and normally manages to save at least 100. When he has a 1000 saved in the bank, he then invests the money into a bond.

I was very impressed with Tim and I have to admit a little bit jealous of his money. I then thought to myself, if Tim can save, then so can I. I set myself a goal of saving up a 1000 and planned to do this within ten months. I had to be less wreckless with my money and it would be a good test for me.

It did not prove to be that difficult and it was a good feeling seeing a healthy bank balance for once. After only eight months I had saved my target of 1000. Instead of putting it into a bond, I decided to take an even bigger risk and to buy some shares. I am happy to say that two years later the share price of the company I had chosen to invest in, had risen by sixty percent. This I have to admit was pure luck as I had simply guessed at who to invest in. The company I chosen had had a dismal few years and its share price was at its lowest ever level. I had heard that the company had recently had some major changes at the top and I decided to gamble just on these few facts.

That was my first experience of investing and it gave the taste for it. I have regularly been buying and selling shares as well as investing in unit trusts for around ten years now. It has also become like a kind of sport or hobby for me, as I am trying to always pick a winner. I have won some and lost some but have had a huge amount of fun along the way.

I now have a certain amount invested in different ways and when for example I have a big car repair bill, I have no need to panic as all I need to do, is to cash in some of the units of my unit trust. That is what I like about a unit trust, unlike with an endowment policy where you need to wait until the end of the term to have access to your money, with a unit trust you can take out all or just some of your units at anytime that you want.

Before I started to save up money, I would often get quite stressed about the future. How would I be able to buy a house? How will I be able to buy a decent car? These are just two of many questions I would ask myself. I would try to ignore the questions by saying to myself that at that stage of my life, I should be earning more money.

I am now very happy that I had that conversation with Tim. Investing money in the way that I do has helped me to get onto the property ladder and also helps to fund my yearly holiday abroad for my family. It also gives me a peace of mind for the future and helps to to sleep easier at night.

The Four Mandatory Buckets Of Personal Finance

Comments (0)

March 4, 2011 at 2:39 pm

I have already written about the financial necessity of saving a portion of any income payment that you receive. This means that a percentage of every single source of income is set aside, marked, or tracked as money that you cannot spend. This task isnt optional if you want to have some basic financial stability or start growing some serious wealth. Saving is the first step and it is the easiest, simplest, but the most emotionally difficult step. I know that starting to save money is emotionally painful because spending money is easy and pleasurable, while saving money feels difficult and challenging. But like any behavior, it becomes easier and natural the more you do it.

As a review, the billionaire John Templeton started out working during the Great Depression but he saved 50% of his income. This guy was serious! OK, you may have a lot of fixed expenses that you just cant cancel immediately, but at least enroll in financial nursery school by saving 1% from all the income that you receive. Or start with only $3 a month and then ratchet up your savings rate continually until you are at least over 10%; or if you are ambitious get it over 30%. (If you are trying to find the loophole, this savings is your after-tax income that you can spend dont count your 401K or medical savings accounts or any other qualified money that you dont have full/immediate access to spending).

The remainder of this article is about what to do with that savings. Economics is the study of allocating scarce resources. Personal economics are similar, but I think that it is better described as: The allocation of your income that you cant spend. If you dont spend this money, and maybe have it setting aside in savings account, what do you do with it? Do you pay down on a credit card, save it for a car, donate it to a worthy cause, or purchase a bank certificate of deposit? How do you go about deciding?

Well, I have given this some thought and have reached a few conclusions. It is my view that your monthly savings needs to be divided among four mandatory categories. By this, I mean that among the zillions of things you can do with savings, it is my view that four of them are absolutely mandatory. For example, if you earn a paycheck (and after all of the taxing authorities take their share) of $1,000 that you can deposit into your checking account and youve chosen a personal savings percentage rate of 8%, then you move $80 ($1,000 X .08) into a separate savings account. Now, you will take this $80 and divide it up into at least the four mandatory categories I am going to discuss, along with any other categories that you value. In this way youll have the whole $80 assigned to specific financial duties to meet your financial goals.

Here are the four categories in priority order:

1. The Vault this is your wealth account. Money gets deposited into this account and it never leaves, like a one-way valve. The Vault is invested and the principal is never spent. It will grow into the largest part of your net worth, generating nearly all of your investment income. If you dont start creating wealth penny-by-penny, youll never have any.

2. Soft Savings a delayed spending account. This money is marked for things that you want to buy, but cant afford to purchase with normal pocket money. For example, a house, car, boat, vacation, college fund for kids, planned medical care, clothing, jewelry, etc. But this also includes maintenance to your home, like a roof, new appliances, new siding, paint, landscaping, remodeling, etc.

3. Paydown Debt Balances making extra principal payments on your credit cards, car loans, and your mortgage. By chipping away at these expenses you will eventually eliminate them all, and then have more money available for other categories. Personal debt is the opposite of financial freedom and dramatically makes it more difficult to reach your financial goals. If you doubt this, look at the interest charges you pay each month and imagine if that money had been invested instead.

4. Financial Education books, magazines, newsletters, seminars, software, investment memberships. Also, hiring professional financial advisors, tax accountants, estate attorneys, etc. (Avoid free advice a buddy, your cousin, or a friends neighbor buy the best, most expensive professional advice you can afford).

As I mentioned before, you can put your savings into places that are only limited by your creativity. But it is my view that these four areas are so important that they need to be continually fed money in a systematic manner.

If you are missing the first account, The Vault, youll never have the money to start investing so youll never receive any investment income. This is pretty much the goal of all personal finance, to help you generate the most investment income. That is why this is the most important of the four categories, to get your money earning money so that you dont have to. (I do not consider any retirement accounts or qualified accounts to be Vault money. This is because you do not have direct control to invest the money or receive any investment income until the government decides that you can).

If you are missing the second account, Soft Savings, you either cant buy what you want, or you have to increase your personal debt. This is moving in the opposite direction of financial freedom you are reducing the amount of money that you can spend each month by the amount of the debt payment, and you are reducing your net worth by the principal and interest that youll be charged. Another symptom of a lack of Soft Savings is disrepair to your car, home, and health because you dont have the money for upkeep. Everything physical needs to be maintained, from your teeth to your vacuum, and it costs money to do so. This depreciates the financial assets that you own, and puts at risk the most important quality of life your health.

If you are missing the third account, Paydown Debt Balances, you are simply going to be the patsy in the financial game of life. People that are building their wealth collect lots of little interest payments from the people that are destroying their wealth by making lots of little interest payments money is transferred every month from one group of people to the other. Which group do you want to be in? Well, your Vault can automatically put you into the group of wealth-builders and your Paydown Debt account starts to extract you from the group of wealth-destroyers. The Paydown Debt account puts you on track to permanently extinguish all of your personal debt. The sooner a personal debt is paid off, the more rapidly you can take all of this money and put it into the other categories.

If you are missing the fourth account, Financial Education, you wont know how to captain your Vault, and you may run it straight into the rocks. Only you will manage your money in a manner that will be to your maximum benefit. So it is best if you pay to learn how to handle money and learn where to put it. But not everyone has an interest in these subjects, and that is fine. For them, instead of personally managing your money, you are going to personally manage your financial advisors. Youll be spending money and time to hire and manage the advisors to attend to financial details.

By allocating your savings into these four categories you are addressing the four most important elements of financial management. Youll be making certain that: Your investment income will always increase by adding to your Vault; youll have money available for extra expenses with your Soft Savings; your net worth will always be increasing with a Paydown Debt account; and youll intelligently learn how to lower your investment risk, raise your investment returns, and lower your tax liability with your Financial Education account. The only source of money to build these critical financial functions to increase your income, net worth, and stability is your savings you simply have to do it.

I recommend you fund these accounts simultaneously do not focus only on debt or only on education because I have seen how it is financially detrimental to do so. For example, lets say that you really want to paydown your debt so you dont contribute anything to The Vault. I have found that if you dont have any investments, your investing skills will be under developed. You will not know how to invest once your debts have been paid off, youll have no investment income to manage, you wont be looking for investing opportunities because that is something you cant afford right now, etc. And as a result, it will be harder to get into the investing game later, youll have more to learn in a shorter amount of time, and may just avoid it altogether and put Vault money into a low paying account.

How much do you allocate among the four categories? Anything more that zero! It is up to you, and your financial situation will fluctuate and be different from others. Just to get some starting percentages, below is my allocation. It is not a recommendation for anyone, it is just what works for me right now.

My current savings rate = 20% of all after-tax income.

(This does not include 401K, medical savings accounts, or other deferred/qualified withholding). This means that 20% of all cash income that hits my checking account each month is set aside into these categories:

1. The Vault receives 50% of total savings each month.
2. Soft Savings receives 20% of savings each month.
3. Paydown Debt receives 20% of savings each month.
4. Financial Education receives 5% of savings each month.
5. And that leaves 5% for other categories each month.

You may receive continual, ongoing income, in addition to some rare, one-time inflows of money. The percentages detailed above are how I allocate regular income savings. But if there is any one-time inflow of money (garage sale, bonus, extra project), then I take 90% of the proceeds and split it among the four accounts, and the other 10% is just spent. You can create your own money rules for different types of income; you can tell by my allocation percentages that my primary focus is to build up the balance of the Vault.

The amount of money that you can save from every source of income is your key to a brighter financial future. Contrarily, a risky and dimmer financial future awaits those that refuse to systematically save money. So be sure that you take the steps necessary to set savings aside and then simultaneously divide it among the four mandatory accounts by consistently allocating money to them. You dont have a financial foundation without these four accounts, but with them, you can build as high as your ambition takes you.

Individual Savings | Tags: Attitude, Buy A House, Buy House, Direct Debit, Financial Matters, Friends, Horror, How Much Money, Insurance, Negative Impact, People, Personal Experiences, Read Books, Saving Money, Self Insurance, Spain Holiday, Stock Market, Struggle

The Benefits Of Saving Money On A Regular Basis

Comments (0)

February 20, 2011 at 11:16 pm

Over the past few years, I have been saving money each month, not for any particular reason like for example to buy a house, but just in case something big went wrong. It is in a way a form of self-insurance. In this article I write about the benefits of doing this and about my own personal experiences, i.e how hard or easy it has been saving in this way.

Maybe I am being paranoid but I always seemed to have far less money than what my friends had. Four years ago a group of us went to Spain for a two-week holiday. I will never forget the moment when one of my friends asked how much money each of us were taking on the holiday. We all answered one by one and to my horror not only did I have the least amount but I had around two hundred pounds less than the next lowest person. It was not because I was being tight, it was because I did not have anymore. It had actually been a real struggle to save up this much.

When I arrived back from this holiday I decided that I needed to change my attitude on financial matters. I read a few books and spoke to a number of people about the best way for me to move forward. I did not want to have to struggle next year if there is to be another holiday for example.

I believed the answer was to start saving an amount every month which would leave my account via direct debit. I was the type of person who would basically spend whatever I had or earned. If it was in the bank therefore I would spend it. It was to leave my account via direct debit I would have no way of course to spend it.

I set up one of these savings policies and started it a modest 30 a month. I am very pleased to say that it did not exactly have a major negative impact on my social life. The policy itself was in some way linked to the stock market and this itself was quite exciting, sad I know. After a year I received a statement through the post and I was quite happy to see that I was actually worth something for a change. I then decided to increase the amount that I was going to save to 50 a month.

In life you never really know when something is going to go wrong, for example your car breaking down, the washing machine packing up or the need for some improvements to your house. By saving in the way that I know do makes these issues far less stressful to deal with as I have the funds readily available to remedy the situation.

At times of course I have enough money saved to splash a bit on say a holiday or a new car.

I would strongly advise other people to commence saving on a regular basis as it has certainly given me a piece of mind.

The Benefits Of Saving For Your Child’s School Finance

Comments (0)

February 11, 2011 at 6:09 am

Defining your savings goals is the first thing to do before you invest, especially when that investment will have an impact on your childs future.

It is after-all your childs future that you are investing in–and school finance cannot be avoided, as babies will grow into adults who need to be given the best opportunities we can offer as parents.

The best advice that any parent can get is to start saving early. College tuition fees can cause a strain on your family’s budget and lifestyle. You need to have a goal to keep you motivated to save. And what better motivation is there than knowing that the money you save will finance your child’s education.

Normally the best stage to start saving for your childs finance towards college tuition is at birth. If, however, you have not started, then the time to start saving is now. It is never too late to start saving.

The sooner you start saving, the more time therell be for compound interest to build up into a nice college fund for your child. Remember that each child should get his or her school finance savings fund.

You also need to decide the amount you intend to save by the time that your child reaches college age. There are many options available for you to choose from when it dollar amount. This means that you calculate the projected cost of public college tuition by the time your child is ready for college.

The other commonly used method, which many parents prefer, involves devoting a fixed percentage of income to their child’s future college costs. The idea is this: whatever you do, you have to have a defined goal. You should save as much as you can, whether it be a large amount, like several hundred dollars a month or a more modest amount, such as $25 to $50 each month.

A college education is an investment in the future of your child. If you truly want to see your child succeed, as all parents do, what could possibly be a better investment?

Study Shows Americans Need to Get Financially Fit

Comments (0)

February 5, 2011 at 7:22 pm

Most Americans lack basic understanding when it comes to their credit score and personal finance, according to the results of a survey by consumer advocacy group Consumer Action and financial services provider Capital One.

The survey polled 1,002 American adults. It gauged respondents’ knowledge of the basics of personal finance like budgeting, saving habits and credit principles.

More than one-third reported they do not use a budget to manage their family’s expenses; over 30 percent of those surveyed either did not know or responded incorrectly when asked to define a good credit score; and nearly one-fourth have never reviewed their credit report.

“Given the growing importance and influence of credit scores on purchasing decisions, it’s startling that the majority of Americans do not understand what constitutes a good credit score,” said Ken McEldowney, executive director of Consumer Action.

Various factors are used to determine a credit score, including a consumer’s payment history, the amount of debt currently owed and the length of credit history.

An amendment to the federal Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act passed in 2004 now allows consumers to receive one free credit report every year from each of the three major credit reporting agencies. Consumers can request their reports online at www.annualcreditreport.com.

As easy as it is to check your credit score and credit report, “many still neglect to take this simple step to protect their credit and their finances,” said Diana Don Colby, director of financial education at Capital One.

Besides reviewing your credit report, experts agree education is the key to a healthy financial future. To help consumers understand the basics, Capital One and Consumer Action created the MoneyWi$e financial education program.

The MoneyWi$e program includes free, multilingual brochures on personal finance topics, such as improving and rebuilding credit, budgeting, saving and investing.

Older Posts »

May 2012
M	T	W	T	F	S	S
« Jan
	1	2	3	4	5	6
7	8	9	10	11	12	13
14	15	16	17	18	19	20
21	22	23	24	25	26	27
28	29	30	31